While I am admittedly a very inexperienced pilot with a scant number of flying hours to my name thus far in my journey as an aviator, I’d like to think I’m nonetheless proactively cautious everytime I jump in the cockpit.
I put this down in equal measures to two things – my conscientiousness as a student determined to absorb every little detail that my instructor teaches me, and the importance I place on self-preservation.
Nonetheless, I recently succumbed to a lapse of concentration that, while not leading to any drastic consequences, had me critically questioning myself and chiding my stupidity.
It was at the stage of my training where I was comfortably conducting circuits one after the other but my instructor was not yet confident enough to send me on my First Solo. However, I was very close to going solo, and personally I thought I was ready for it.
As I guess most do at this point in their students’ progress, my instructors was completely hands off. In order to observe me negotiate and recover from any erroneous situations I got us into, he wouldn’t say or do anything to comment on my flying of the circuit unless it became severe. So there we were going around the circuit at my home airport, which conveniently is situated a mere stone’s throw from my house.
Growing up so close to the airport, my siblings and I always wondered what our house would look like from the cockpit of those small aircraft I could here passing over us. The circuit flight path at my home airport goes directly over our house on late downwind, but I’d yet to try and spy our backyard from above – until now.
With everything under control in the cockpit and time seemingly on my side now that I was confident flying circuits, on mid-downwind I casually start peering out the window to try and find our house.
With each fly over I gradually increase the duration of my distraction before returning to the task at hand – doing my BUMPFISH checks and setting our Piper Warrior up for the turn onto base.
Put it down to either overconfidence or ignorance, but I could’ve sworn this wasn’t negatively affecting my flying. But in hindsight I guess it had to happen.
With my eyes, head, and concentration on the ground rather than on flying the aircraft, on what could only be referred to as ‘ludicrously late downwind, my instructor casually asks me, “So, are we planning on turning onto base anytime soon?”. I snap back to attention and realise that I’d inadvertently extended our downwind leg well beyond the point where we’d normally turn onto base.
In a frenzied fit of panged embarassment I immediately start pulling the power back to 1500rpm. But it’s not over. My instructor, God bless him, remains calm as a cucumber as he says, “Might be an idea to get those pre-landing checks out of the way first”.
Good Lord – talk about your rookie mistakes! I race through my BUMPFISH checks thoroughly yet hastily, yank up the first two stages of flap, and fly an oblique base leg to get back on track by the time we turn onto final.
While nothing disastrous came of my lapse in concentration (I thank my instructor for that) I still felt foolish for letting it happen. I’ve heard stories about other student pilots making similar mistakes, some of whom met with tragic circumstances as a result, so I know I should have known better.
Since that day I’ve made a promise to myself to keep my head on the job of flying the aircraft, and tempered my confidence in my own abilities as a pilot in order to not let complacency creep in.
I’m still happy with my progress as a student pilot and am now nearing the completion of my PPL, but I’ll never forget that paying complete attention to the task at hand, regardless of what else may be going through my head, is of the utmost importance.